It's awful what's happening to our kids today. Youngsters shooting each other, groups raping girls, this kind of stuff. Yes, I know teen years have alw..."/>
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REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS
Prosecutor: Nine teens charged in bullying that led to girl's suicide
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 9:11 AM
NIKI2
Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...
Quote:Nine Massachusetts teenagers have been charged with involvement in a monthslong campaign of bullying that led to the January suicide of a 15-year-old girl, a prosecutor said. Phoebe Prince's body was found hanging in the stairway leading to her family's second-floor apartment in South Hadley, Northwestern District Attorney Elizabeth D. Scheibel told reporters Monday in the western Massachusetts town of Northampton. "It appears that Phoebe's death on January 14 followed a torturous day for her when she was subjected to verbal harassment and physical abuse," Scheibel said. Earlier that day, Phoebe had been harassed as she studied in the library at South Hadley High School, apparently in the presence of a faculty member and several students, none of whom reported it until after the girl's death, Scheibel said. Phoebe, who had recently moved to the area with her family from Ireland, also was harassed as she walked through the halls of the school that day and as she walked on the street toward her home, the prosecutor said. The harassment that day, by one male and two females, "appears to have been motivated by the group's displeasure with Phoebe's brief dating relationship with a male student that had ended six weeks earlier," she said. But that day's events were not isolated; they "were the culmination of a nearly three-month campaign of verbally abusive, assaultive behavior and threats of physical harm toward Phoebe on school grounds by several South Hadley students," Scheibel added. "Their conduct far exceeded the limits of normal teenage relationship-related quarrels. The investigation revealed relentless activity directed toward Phoebe designed to humiliate her and to make it impossible for her to remain at school."
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 1:05 PM
FREMDFIRMA
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 1:12 PM
SIGNYM
I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 1:39 PM
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 9:04 AM
BYTEMITE
Quote:When Smith rose to speak, he choked up. "What's been happening has to stop in our community," he said. "I look around and see a lot of soldiers tonight, which is good. We need you." He described how the anti-bullying taskforce would organize itself going forward, and asked for volunteers. He concluded, "I'm really hopeful for our kids—for their good, which so many of you are here about, and that it's time to move on."
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 9:16 AM
Quote:Teachers at the school are aghast at how it's being treated in the media. "I wouldn't teach here if the climate truly was as it's being portrayed," one told me. When I talked with a group of South Hadley students earlier this month, the prevailing sentiment was that, yes, Phoebe had been mistreated but not in some unprecedented way. "A lot of it was normal girl drama," one girl told me. "If you want to label it bullying, then I've bullied girls and girls have bullied me. Her history made it affect her more. It wasn't the school being terrible. It was really bad, it was one of the worst things I've heard of some girls doing to another girl. But it wouldn't have hurt most people that much."
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 9:36 AM
MINCINGBEAST
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 11:13 AM
Quote:Oh, how frustrating! Teachers, denying their moral culpability!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:47 PM
Quote:Originally posted by mincingbeast: bullies today just have so many better tools at their disposal.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:49 PM
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:50 PM
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:51 PM
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:52 PM
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:56 PM
CHRISISALL
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 12:57 PM
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 1:13 PM
KWICKO
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)
Quote:Originally posted by SignyM: Oh, how frustrating! Teachers, denying their moral culpability!
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 4:42 PM
KANEMAN
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 4:51 PM
Quote:Originally posted by kaneman: I live down the road.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010 4:57 PM
Thursday, April 1, 2010 8:52 AM
Thursday, April 1, 2010 9:06 AM
Friday, April 2, 2010 6:06 AM
JEWELSTAITEFAN
Quote:Originally posted by Niki2: Yeah, Byte, after all, it's only weaklings and those who deserve it who get bullied...what's that thing about "If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen"? Oh, wait, I guess she did... Ouch. "I'm just right. Kinda like the sun rising in the east and the world being round...its not a need its just the way it is." Hero, 3/1/10
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